Word: emperor
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...Muslim country, Pope Benedict XVI raised a ruckus with a provocative lecture on the relationship between faith, reason and violence on a visit to Regensburg University, where he once taught theology. As a good professor might, he quoted a 14th [an error occurred while processing this directive] century Byzantine Emperor. But this Emperor was making a furious criticism of Islam: "Show me just what Muhammad brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." Perhaps the 79-year-old Pontiff hoped...
...Show me just what Muhammad brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." POPE BENEDICT XVI, quoting the 14th century Byzantine Emperor Manuel II Paleologus during a lecture in Germany...
...possible that Benedict has misconstrued what Manuel meant about Islam's being spread by the sword. The ancient emperor may have been alluding not to sword's-edge conversion, but merely (if "merely" is the right word) to Islam's early intent to conquer the world, whose inhabitants would eventually come around to the true faith of their own accord. In that case, it?s probably accurate. That was the plan in the first generations after Mohammed, and that may be enough to scare anyone who thinks that it has been sustained since then...
...Forced Argument on Forced Conversions Viewpoint: Kidnapped journalists converting at gunpoint. The Pope quoting a 14th century Byzantine emperor. The sudden focus on forced conversions to Islam reflects a fundamental misreading of that religion's history
...reminded of all this recently, when I read the edition by Professor Theodore Khoury (M?nster) of part of the dialogue carried on - perhaps in 1391 in the winter barracks near Ankara - by the erudite Byzantine emperor Manuel II Paleologus and an educated Persian on the subject of Christianity and Islam, and the truth of both. It was presumably the emperor himself who set down this dialogue, during the siege of Constantinople between 1394 and 1402; and this would explain why his arguments are given in greater detail than those of his Persian interlocutor. The dialogue ranges widely over the structures...